Colon cancer increasing in young adults

New research published in JAMA Surgery shows that the rate of adults younger than 50 with colorectal cancer continues to rise and is expected to increase even more during the next 15 years. By contrast, the incidence of colorectal cancer in people over 50 keeps falling, likely due to an increase in colonoscopy screening.

Researchers from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston utilized data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) colorectal cancer registry to assess the age disparities in colorectal cancer cases. They found that colorectal cancer rates increased among patients aged 20 to 49.

If this trend continues, the researchers estimated that by the year 2020, colon cancer rates will increase by 37.8 percent in the 20 to 34 age group. By 2030. they could increase by as much as 90 percent for that age group.

The team called for more research into potential causes and external factors responsible for rise of this cancer among younger adults.

Blood pressure drug reverses diabetes in mice

A common blood pressure medication has been found to reverse diabetes in mice and soon scientists at the University of Alabama at Birmingham will begin clinical trials to see if the same thing is possible with humans.

The randomized trial, set to begin in early 2015, will consist of 52 people between the ages of 19 and 45, who are within three months of having received a type 1 diabetes diagnosis. Blood sugar levels will be monitored daily, and all participants will maintain normal insulin-pump therapy. Some in the study will randomly be given the blood pressure drug, verapamil, while others will receive a placebo.

Verapamil, often used to treat migraines and irregular heartbeat in humans, has also reduced the levels of the protein TXNIP in animal trials. In people with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, the destruction of beta cells has been linked to an increase of TXNIP in pancreatic beta cells. Lead researcher, Dr. Anath Shalev, said the results in animals indicates that, “by lowering TXNIP, even in the context of the worst diabetes, we have beneficial effects.”

Verapamil has been sold and used for more than 30 years and is not likely to produce severe side effects.

Researchers hope they are on the right track to finding a medication that does not just slow the rate of beta cell decline–and thus the rate of diabetes–but actually stops diabetes from progressing.

Prenatal pollution linked to ADHD

New research at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health has found that children exposed in the womb to a certain component of air pollution may be at a higher risk for developing ADHD.

For the study, the research team followed 233 nonsmoking pregnant women and their children in New York City from pregnancy into childhood, and found that children born to mothers exposed to high levels of a pollutant known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) during pregnancy had five times higher risk of developing symptoms of ADHD – particularly inattention–than children whose mothers did not have high PAH exposure. PAH are air pollutants caused by car traffic, residential boilers and electricity-generating plants that run on fossil fuel.

The connection between PAH and ADHD is not fully understood, but the researchers suggested several possibilities of how the PAH impacts the body, including disruption of the endocrine system, DNA damage, interference with placental growth factors, and oxidative stress.